


you're my salvage (you're my balance)

by lunasasylum



Category: Professional Wrestling, World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: Betrayal, Boys In Love, Declarations Of Love, Developing Relationship, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Forgiveness, Healing, Healthy Relationships, Love Confessions, M/M, Pain, Seth Finally Apologizes to Roman
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-13
Updated: 2018-10-13
Packaged: 2019-07-23 17:51:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16163885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lunasasylum/pseuds/lunasasylum
Summary: Now isn't the right time either.But, now is when he needs the answer.Roman's sharing his bed with Seth, his best friend, or something else.He's not too sure yet.// or the Shield breaks again, and Roman's searching for some answers.





	you're my salvage (you're my balance)

_His lungs burned. The bruises forming on his arms and shoulders began to ache. He desperately needed to get out the ring, he needed to make the damn tag. But, Braun kept dragging him away. It was too much now._

_Too much stimulation, too much happening all at once._

_He glanced back at his corner and saw Seth being ripped off the apron, and pulled into a one on one with Dolph Ziggler._

_God, he really fucking hated Dolph Ziggler._

_A fierce pain ripped through his legs and suddenly, he just wanted to sleep. He just wanted to lay down and take a nap. But, there was too much resting on them for him to do that. All he had to do was pull through and make some room. He just needed some space._

_Still, the match felt like it had been going on forever._

_He knew that any team with Braun Strowman on it wouldn't be an easy battle, but he never expected it to be this hard. It seemed every time he stepped in the ring, Braun was there too. Ready to clobber him with everything he had._

_It was wearing him down, the fighting, the beatings, all of it. He really couldn't take much more, and still he was in the ring. He always refused to tap out, even when he knew he should._

_He believed in them._

_Believe in the Shield._

_They're the strongest faction in WWE history, there wasn't a thing they couldn't survive. Even if they didn't win, they'd still be together at the end of the night. That, however, wasn't a reason to stop fighting. It wasn't a reason to stop trying._

_Hope for the best possible outcome._

_Always prepare for the worst._

_Things usually had predisposition to work in the their favor for some reason. Sometimes, just as everything was fading away, they'd make the tag, they'd find a way, someone would come out of the woodworks and it'd all fall into place._

_Maybe that should've been the first inkling that things were going to go wrong. Things had been working too well recently. Everything had been falling in their favor, not just most things._

_So, when he kicks Braun in the face, and elbows Drew off the apron, he knows it's his chance to make the tag._

_His brother would come in, finish the match, and they'd be victorious tonight._

_All he had to do was make it over to that damn corner._

_Shaking off Braun once more, he lunged over to the corner. The hot skin of his palm connected with..._

_The flat material of the mat._

_His eyes darted up to see if Drew had gotten to him first, but he didn't._

_His heart was in his throat as he watched him walk around the ring and come around the other side with a kendo stick._

**_No._ **

_The wood of the stick met his vest before he could even fully process what was happening. A horrible scream erupted from his throat as he was continually pounded with the stick. There was decent, yet lengthy, pause before a steel chair met his back again and again._

_He's pretty sure he blacked out and when he opened his eyes, he was laying in the middle of the ring. Seth was next to him, reaching out and almost laying his face against Roman's outstretched palm._

_"Roman." Seth rasped to him and then fixed his eyes on something behind him._

_When he turned towards the ramp near the exit, there he saw Braun smiling with Dolph and Drew._

_And Dean._

* * *

  _The ride to the hotel and the night was rough. They were aching all over, everything was bruised or bleeding._

_Seth basically propped him up in the elevator, but he was resting against the wall in the shower. Roman pulled him out and took him to bed, a thick silence falling over the room._

_Once they were both clean and clothed, they laid together in silence. Seth was curled around his side, staring at the wall, while Roman looked at the ceiling._

_"Did that really just happen?" Seth whispered, voice quiet and almost scared._

_Nodding, even though Seth couldn't see him, Roman answered, "Yeah, it really did."_

_Something like a shudder comes from Seth's body and Roman holds him a little closer._

_He's not sure what comes after this, or even what happens on Monday, or in the next coming weeks. But, he's here. Seth's still here, and Dean isn't._

_And if that doesn't knock the breath out of him just a little bit, he's not sure._

_A heaviness settles over his chest and Roman forgets where he is for a second._

_But, he remembers that Seth is laying on his chest, pressed against the bruises on his ribs. It's really starting to hurt but he can feel Seth's heart beating against his side, and he needs the reminder that he's not alone tonight. So, he takes a deep, painful breath and lets him rest there._

_"Roman?" Seth rasps, speaking louder shows Roman that his voice is actually shot from all the screaming tonight._

_Swallowing, Roman replies, "Yeah."_

_"I love you."_

_"Then why did you leave the first time?" It's a raw question. Probably the wrong thing to say after someone confesses their feelings to you. It hurts too much to ask, but he needs to know. He needs to know if he's being setup again, if this just a part of Seth's plans. He just needs something real and genuine to hold on to tonight._

_And, it's been on the tip of his tongue to ask for a while now, but there was never a right time. First, Seth and Dean were trying to murder each other on national TV when he just left. Then, he got injured. And, there was so much shit happening in between with the brand split and Dean going to Smackdown._

_After that Roman was so confused and tired of being pissed and hurt that when Seth was getting his ass handed to him by Kevin Owens and Chris Jericho, he didn't think twice about running out to come help him. But, they didn't talk about that either._

_Then, Dean came to Raw and him and Seth were killing each other on TV again, just for Seth to apologize to Dean. Which he deserved of course, Seth's betrayal hurt Dean a lot differently, he thought he was his brother. To Roman, Seth's betrayal broke something different in him. It was something a national beating couldn't fix._

_When things started falling into place again, the Shield was finally back together and it didn't seem like the time to dredge up the past or what broke them in the first place. But, Dean got hurt and things started cracking again. It felt like pieces kept falling out of place just as they kept falling in place. Of course, he still had Seth's back, they were on good terms now._

_So, when Dean came back, Roman resigned himself to just forgive and forget. Even if he never really got the apology to forgive. He'd just forget._

_Now isn't the right time either. But, now is when he needs the answer. Roman's sharing his bed with Seth, his best friend, or something else. He's not too sure yet._

_They shared beds all the time when they were coming up, before they knew they could get separate rooms. But, Roman always slept in the bed with Seth. Dean was too much of a wild sleeper to share a bed with either of them, and even though Roman took up a lot of space, he was quiet when he slept. And, on those mornings where he'd find Seth rolled up into his arms, well, he tried not to think to hard about it._

_Seth was something different. He was something new, something entirely unexplored._

_Roman had been pretty open to liking whomever pleased his eye, male or female. But, Seth caught him in a different way. He'd look at Seth and find that he couldn't stop looking at him. Then, he'd find that he couldn't look at anybody else. Soon, he'd see that didn't want to look at anyone else. There was something in the way that Seth moved. He was lithe and smooth, always calculated in everything he did. Even his words._

_When he left, he always found a way to say the things that would hurt them the most._

_The way that he carried himself had Roman hooked from the very beginning._

_And for years, he stayed hooked on Seth. Roman tried to ignore it, he tried smash it down, he could pretend it wasn't there. But, after Dean went to Smackdown and he realized he'd be traveling alone, he remembered how much he missed Seth. It went from the dull ache in the back of his mind to the very present pain in his heart._

_Waking up alone and empty took so much out of him sometimes._

_So, he needs to know._

_Roman deserves to know._

_Seth trails a timid hand down Roman's side. "I was scared," He clears his throat and continues speaking._

_"I didn't really like guys before you, and I liked you a little too much for my own good. I couldn't stay with you and Dean and lie to you and pretend. It was kinda obvious." Seth gives a rough and hollow laugh. "Or, I thought it was. I don't know. I just loved you and I didn't want to. I didn't want to stare at you longingly and say 'great match', when I was falling in love with you. So, I left. I had to."_

_The revelation cuts through him like a knife._

_"You don't have to say that, because of...what happened tonight." Roman doesn't even know what to call tonight's events._

_Seth shakes his head as best as he can with his head on Roman's chest. "I need you to know that I didn't leave because I hated you, I had to leave to protect my sanity." Shuffling a bit, Seth leans into him a little more. "I need you to know that, even if you don't feel the same way."  
_

_But, before Roman can say something, before he can confirm his feelings for him, Seth says something that makes him choke._

_"I'm sorry."_

_It really does stop Roman in his tracks because no matter what he thought, he still wasn't expecting to hear it. Especially not tonight._

_"I'm really sorry for hurting you, Roman. If I could go back, I'd do it differently. I'd do it in a way that doesn't make you hate me. I'd do it in a way that doesn't make you tense up every time I walk into a room, or flinch when I touch you."_

_Roman was about to argue that he doesn't do that, but he really wouldn't know if he does._

_S_ _eth, the most observant person he knows, right after Dean (and even thinking of his name kind of takes his breath away), would know._

_There's a sharp silence before Roman speaks up._

_"You kind of," He pauses, trying to drum up the right words. "You broke like, my whole fucking chest." It wasn't eloquent, but it was honest. Seth did more than just crack him, he shattered his entire ribcage. He left pieces of bone in his lungs for Roman to pick out in his empty bed, alone at night._

_Seth's voice cracks when speaks again. "I'm sorry. I know, and I'm so sorry."_

_And the apologies sound weird coming out of Seth's mouth. Roman's not used to hearing him apologize and Roman's pretty sure Seth has apologized to a total of four people in his entire life, two if he's counting how many times Seth has meant it. It's a lot different when they're not in front of hundreds of thousands of people. It's just them in the dark of a room._

_Two men being honest about their feelings._

_God, Roman's mom would be so proud of him._

_"I don't hate you, y'know?" Roman waits and then clarifies when Seth doesn't answer. "I do feel the same way about you. I wish I didn't sometimes. But, I do. I think I always did."_

_When he feels Seth exhale, Roman knows he finally got something right tonight._

* * *

The air between them is different in the morning. They move a little differently. Even the plane ride home is different. They're sitting together, and somehow they're close but not close enough.

Getting to the hotel in Chicago was easy. Roman tried not to think about last night. (Or that morning? The travel has his schedule messed up.) He tries not to think about Dean. He just wants to put one foot in front of the other and get through the day.

But, Seth keeps looking at him when he thinks Roman's not looking. Except, Roman's always looking. He's never  _not_ looking at Seth.

So, when they get to the room, he has to address, because he's spent so long not addressing the things that eat away at him until there's nothing left. And, usually there's someone for him to call, but the person he usually calls is there. 

They need to talk about it.

When Seth's out of the shower, he pauses as if just remembering the room has two beds and he has an option. Roman doesn't give him time to make a choice.

"Seth." 

Looking back to Roman, Seth raises hesitant eyebrows and a flurry of emotions crosses his face. Coming to sit next to Roman on the edge of the bed, Seth inhales sharply and rubs his palms along the comforter. "Yeah?"

"I need you to know," Suddenly, Roman doesn't have the words for it. He's thought so much about what he would say if Seth liked him back. It took him to sleep quite a few nights and he never seemed to be satisfied with his answer. Now, he doesn't even know what to say. "That I don't want you to stay with me because you feel like you have to, y'know?"

Seth opens his mouth, presumably to interrupt but Roman stops him. "No, just hear me out. You don't owe me anything. You shouldn't be stuck with me."

Roman turns to look at him and Seth his in the process of rolling his eyes. "I really kind of hate you sometimes, man. I swear, you're the only person who'd give a guy an out after confessing his feelings like 15 hours ago. You're like out of a fucking movie or something." He's smiling as he speaks and it makes Roman smile too. It feels weird given last night's events and the current state of their bodies. "I'm here, with you, next to you, because I want to be. I want to try this, whatever this is. I want to be here, for as long as you'll have me."

Despite the lingering tension, Roman pulls him into this crushing hug that steals Seth's breath right out of his body. But, he still hugs Roman back.

So, they crawl back into bed, because it's late and the last 24 hours have taken too much out of them.

Seth curls up next to Roman, who ignores the warm tenderness of his bruises and hugs Seth to his body.

It's enough for tonight.


End file.
